


what a powerful name it is

by Mattition



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: M/M, Marriage, POV Outsider
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-21
Updated: 2020-11-21
Packaged: 2021-03-09 20:01:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,220
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27661742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mattition/pseuds/Mattition
Summary: 5 +1 of jonelias wedding content
Relationships: Elias Bouchard | Jonah Magnus/Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist, Elias Bouchard/Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist
Comments: 6
Kudos: 55





	what a powerful name it is

**Author's Note:**

> I saw [this tweet](https://twitter.com/wingsifer/status/1328780664175546370) from wingsifer and went feral so here's a bunch of ppl finding out abt jonelias marriage because it is my duty.
> 
> Title is from What A Beautiful Name, specifically [this cover by Joseph Solomon](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MVJVm3FOcJA&list=TLPQMjExMTIwMjASFzbC8973Zg&index=2) because I love gospel music AND I love twisting that music to fit my ff sensibilities.

1

Tim comes in late on Monday. He’s immediately waylaid by Sasha and Martin, who pull him into archival storage and snap the door shut. Martin looks a bit sick, and Sasha’s eyes are wide.

“What happened?” says Tim, urgently. Martin makes a mournful little noise. Sasha pats him on the arm as she says,

“Jon’s wearing a ring,”

“Uh, okay?”

“On his ring finger.”

“We need you to ask him about it because you’re the nosiest.” Says Martin. Tim clutches his pearls in offense. “Shut up, Timjamin, you know it’s true.”

“Fine,” Tim sighs, and they leave the stacks. Jon is standing in the breakroom with his arms crossed. He looks unimpressed. His left hand happens to be the one on top, and there is the offending piece of jewelry, a thin silver band with a row of gems glinting in the florescent light of the basement. 

“What’s all this, then?” asks Jon, tiredly. He does most everything tiredly these days; the archives are an absolute mess and Elias keeps coming down to check on them, which Tim thinks must be stressful, your boss hovering all the time. He looks tired, but he doesn’t look that sickly tired he used to get when he’d go on a research spiral when they were all still upstairs. His cheeks are full and flushed with a healthy pallor, and his eyes are still that kind of smug glittering hazel that had been a major factor in his and Tim’s bad decision to have a drunken fling their first year together in research. Tim hopes that his apparent health is a product of whoever he’s engaged to being a good influence; he’d love to know what a happy, healthy, well-adjusted Jon is like. 

“I should be asking you, Jon, you’ve got some new bling.” Tim gestures to Jon’s hand, and Jon squints, looking down at the ring as if he’d never seen it before.

“Yes, Elias proposed,”

“Elias!?” The three of them exclaim, nonplussed. Jon scoffs and rolls his eyes. Prick.

“I believe you’ve met.”

“Isn’t that a bit fast?” 

“We’ve been together for two years, Tim, do try keep up.” And with that Jon turns and stomps his way towards his office. You’d think the guy would be happier if he’d just got engaged, but, Tim supposes, he’s still Jon, and Jon is terribly uncomfortable with anything approaching personal. Tim had thought Jon hated him those first few weeks they’d met, when Tim would spout off about this thing or that, always trying to include others in the conversation, and Jon would be curled up in his little desk in the darkest corner, and glare out, snap like a junkyard dog at anyone who came too close. Tim and Jon had come to the Institute at about the same time, and they’d been in research together for about four years before being moved to the archives, so Tim’d had the time to wear down Jon’s defenses a bit, wiggle through those sparse gaps in his walls, make himself a place there. It’s terribly confusing and distressing to realize that maybe he and Jon aren’t as good of friends as he’d thought. 

Tim turns to his coworkers. Sasha looks completely baffled, and Martin looks a bit devastated. Tim pats him on the shoulder. He certainly hadn’t known that Jon was dating Elias. That’s a fact that he thinks would have been relevant when Jon got the head archivist job. Not that he thinks Elias just gave him the job because of it, but Sasha has the qualifications for it, and Jon doesn’t.

It certainly puts Elias’ smug teasing at Jon’s birthday into perspective, and Jon’s rampant blushing every time Elias refused to call him by his name. Tim hopes it wasn’t some weird foreplay thing, then immediately scolds himself for the uncharitable thought. He knows what Jon’s like in bed, as their Bad Decision wasn’t a one-time thing, and while he’s certainly got some kinks and quirks, he wasn’t really the exhibitionist type. 

Tim and the others get back to work, but he has a bit of a time getting it off his mind. He can’t stop thinking of those two together, and he really wants to see their dynamic as a couple. Maybe Elias is one of those domineering boyfriends, who makes decisions and expects their partner to follow along. That certainly goes with Elias’ character, but doesn’t make much sense for Jon ‘rules were made to be broken’ Sims. Maybe Elias is one of those guys who is just head over heels for their partner and refuses to stop shouting it from the rooftops. Or maybe not. Whatever it is, Tim hopes those two are happy together; Jon at least deserves that much.

2

Georgie takes a break from editing to go downstairs and check the mail. There’s a thick cardstock envelope tucked between a couple bills, and she smiles. She’s not been able to find her perfect partner, but she’s always happy to see a wedding invite in her mailbox. She can’t think of which of her Uni friends would be getting married, though. She’s been to a couple weddings in the past year, as it’s apparently that time in her life where her friends are having kids and weddings and buying houses. Last she can recall, though, all the friends she considers herself close enough to to warrant a wedding invite are either single or already married. 

She likes a mystery, she supposes. 

She slices the envelope open neatly with a kitchen knife once she gets back into her flat. The invitation is classy and expensive feeling, all crème and navy and silver. She unties the little blue ribbon, and the little folded doors open to reveal the names. She drops the other mail and scrambles for her phone.

She hasn’t talked to him in years, but he’s still there in her contacts, under the J’s where he’s been since they were 19. She hits ‘call,’ glancing at the time, 21:38, not too late. It rings a few times before a man’s voice comes down the line. It is not Jon.

“Who is this?” He sounds annoyed. 

“Er. I’m sorry, I must have a wrong number,” Georgie says, pulling the phone from her face to check the contact. The number looks right, but she’ll admit that she doesn’t remember it quite so well as she did once upon a time. The man on the other side huffs.

“My apologies; you’re calling for Jon, yes?”

“I—yes, I am,”

“He’s asleep right now, and if you’re the Georgie I think you are, then you know how rare a circumstance that is.” He hasn’t stopped sounding annoyed, but his voice has a little tinge of fondness, so Georgie concludes that’s maybe just what his voice sounds like.

“Yeah, I do, actually. I’m sorry to call so late, but I just…I got a wedding invitation?”

“Oh,” he laughs. She looks at the invitation again, reads it. _We invite you to celebrate the wedding of Elias Bouchard & Jonathan Sims_. She assumes she’s talking to Elias Bouchard. “You didn’t have to RSVP immediately, but I can mark you down, if you give me a moment. Were you planning on bringing a plus one?” 

There’s a moment of profound clarity and sadness in Georgie as she realizes that Jon could be a completely different person than she remembers him. She isn’t so self-absorbed as to think that people outside of her immediate circle don’t change and lead their own lives, but she realizes with all the power of an oncoming train that she will never see what it is that made him change so much. Even if they fix their relationship, and she is holding an olive branch in her hand, even if they become best friends, Georgie will never really know what Jon has been through. She won’t have been there. She will meet his new friends at the wedding, and she will tell them all about Two Drink Jon, and their punk band, and all about what he was like in Uni, and they’ll laugh at him and tease him gently, more gently than she was ever able to; she’s always been a bit heavy-handed and he’s always been a bit sensitive. She doesn’t feel fear, but she can feel sorrow, and, as she talks to the man with the authority to answer Jon’s phone so that he can sleep, the man whose name is cuddled up to his on a wedding invite, she breathes out sorrow for that lost time. 

She tells him that she’s not bringing a plus one. He tells her that she has another couple of weeks to make sure, and if she decides on a date, to call him directly. He gives her his number. Before they ring off, he says,

“Thank you for coming, or at least considering it, Jon was a bit unsure about sending you an invite; he was worried you wouldn’t want to see him.”

“Oh.” Says Georgie. Her heart hurts. “I do want to see him. I want us to be friends again.”

“I’m glad to hear it,” Elias says. “Bye, Georgina, it was lovely talking to you.”

“Bye,” she replies. Just as she goes to hang up, she hears, distantly, Jon’s tired voice. _Elias? Why did you leave?_ Elias makes a soft sound, almost a coo, and rings off as he replies,

“Sorry, darling, your phone—”

Georgie sits her phone down on the kitchen counter and looks down at the Admiral, sprawled out in front of her on the counter. She and Jon had picked him out together, at the animal shelter. He’d been a scrappy, matted little thing, ugly and angry. Jon had fallen for him, and of course the ginger ball of malice had taken an immediate liking to him. She loved him, too, of course, but he and Jon had a certain comradery. He should have gone with Jon in the breakup, but Jon’s flat at the time didn’t allow pets, so he’d said a more tearful goodbye to the Admiral than he even gave Georgie. At the time, it had offended her, made her even angrier. How could this man hold so much sincere love and emotion for an animal, but couldn’t spare her the time of day? She knows better now. She resolves to attend his wedding, meet his partner, and try to go back to the way it was. She wants to know the man who could do what she couldn’t, love Jon the way he needed to be able to love back. They had been best friends, once. She wants it back. 

3

Ntiri had certainly been surprised to receive a wedding invitation from their cousin Jon. Last they’d heard from him, he was an angry twenty-something just out of University. That was only a few years ago, but they’ll admit that they hadn’t kept up with him. He really was an odd one out in their family; his father had been the same, and even though he was raised by their grandmother, Jon just wasn’t the social type. Whenever they’d come for holidays, Jon would do the bare minimum of celebration and ceremony and then be stuck back in the corner or in his room if he could get away with it, nose stuck in a book. Ntiri could understand it somewhat; their whole thing with gender was less drastic than Jon’s had been, especially since their parents were a lot younger and queerer than grandmother had been. But they were set to be in the UK at the time of the wedding, which is unusual, as they are often traveling to far-off places for Nat Geo and the like. 

They’d offered Jon to take his wedding photos, but he’d laughed nervously and told them that his fiancé already had someone booked. He’d sounded nervously excited the whole phone call, really. They could recall, distantly, Jon once rambling to them at a family gathering. They can’t quite recall what he’d been talking about, as they had been somewhat of a self-absorbed teen, with little time for their tiny cousin spouting off. But they remember that half-excited half-nervous tone, like he wasn’t used to being allowed to speak for so long, and each word was waiting to be snapped off at the end. They’re sad to think that they may have contributed to that tone following him into adulthood. 

The wedding is beautiful. The venue is the sprawling gardens of some manor house out in Edinburgh. The ceremony was a bit of this from their culture, and a bit of that from Jon’s fiancé’s. And Ntiri had tried not to be disappointed that Jon had followed his father’s path and got with a white boy. They’d googled him, and apparently he was the head of some weird research institute. He was handsome enough, with piercing green eyes and a smug smile. And he was nice enough, too. He had greeted Ntiri by name, pronounced correctly even, and asked after their latest article. And he certainly loves Jon enough. Though some of their other family had come, Ntiri feels some responsibility for Jon, and has been watching him and Elias interacting. Elias _stares_ at Jon, like he can’t bear to take his eyes away, and Jon will turn to him, and catch his eye and flush under the attention. Elias seems a bit possessive, always clutching Jon to his side or putting proprietary hands on him, but it doesn’t seem too malicious, so Ntiri decides it’s not worth going into. 

“It’s a bit rude of you,” they tell him, when he stops to chat with them. He quirks a confused smile. “You’re the second of the cousins to get married, you’re making all the rest of us look bad!” Jon laughs along with them.

“I guess I could apologise, but I find I’m not quite sorry.”

“It’s okay, I’m used to being a disappointment.”

“Hopefully I haven’t lost my title as family disappointment?”

“It’s mine now. You’ve gone and got a respectable job and got yourself married, and I’m just some gay kid with a camera.”

“Since when is my job more respectable than yours?” Laughs Jon. “You work for a critically-acclaimed publication; I read scary stories.”

“I have a youtube channel, you work in a real building,” They bicker back and forth like this for a bit, and Ntiri feels a little pang of something that could be nostalgia; a sort of wistfulness for the childhood they could have shared with Jon. If Jon had been raised by his own parents, and they’d given him the confidence he deserved, or the support he so sorely needed, would they have been like this? Would Ntiri have been able to be there for him while he was figuring himself out? Would Jon look up to them? Would they have real, genuine friendship and love in their heart for him, instead of that familial protective instinct and peripheral love? 

They hadn’t known Jon could look like this. He is smiling wide, cheeks flushed and hands fluttering with joy. He keeps touching his ring, as if to make sure it’s still there. When he speaks, that tinge of nervousness is almost entirely gone. It warms Ntiri’s heart to hear, and certainly builds Elias’ image in their head. If that white boy can make Jon act like this, then he must not be so bad.

4

One of Caroline’s commuter buddies is a haggard but handsome man who dresses about 10 years too old for his age. She’d put him at about 26, but he perpetually wears frumpy trousers and slightly oversized outerwear. It’d be that trendy dark academia kind of thing if he wore it a little more confidently, or if he seemed like he could keep himself together, but as it is, he’s just a bit of a mess. They’ve never spoken, but sometimes they’ll not to each other or share commiserating looks if there’s someone doing crazy shit in the car they’re both on. 

He goes missing one day, and she normally wouldn’t be concerned, she’d just assume that his schedule got changed at work or he moved or something, were it not for the anxiety he exuded for a few months before disappearing. She’s worried about him, he’s exactly the type people might prey upon, but she doesn’t know anything about him, just that someone called Elias rings him all the time, seemingly just to annoy him. It seems like a fond kind of relationship though.

She’s still debating what to do about him when he suddenly reappears. It’s about a month after his disappearance, and it looks like it’s done him some good. He looks healthier, for one thing, the dark smudges under his eyes are nearly invisible, and his hair is glossy and brushed into a style for once. Even his clothes are better fitting, less frumpy and more expensive looking. She almost wouldn’t recognize him if it weren’t for the way he quirks his mouth into a semblance of a smile when they catch eyes. The seat he happens to find is directly across the train car from her, and she watches him over top of her phone screen. He is flipping through a non-descript horror novel and keeps rolling his eyes. He eventually pulls out a pencil and starts annotating it. Caroline thinks this is so adorable that she almost misses the ring on his finger. He’s wearing a wedding band stacked on top of an engagement ring, both of them understated but eye-catching. She realizes with some relief that his disappearance was something rather less sinister than she had been catastrophizing. He glances up at her when the train stops at a station. She smiles and gestures to his hand.

“You got married,” She tells him. He can’t quite hold back a smile. It transforms his face. Combined with his makeover, he looks about 10 years younger, and 20 times more handsome. “Congratulations!”

“Thank you,” he says shyly. 

“Sorry, I know I’m breaking the sacred rule of sharing a metro route with someone; I was just kind of worried when you disappeared last month.” He laughs lightly and waves her apology away.

“I was on holiday with my husband,” he reassures. His nose crinkles a bit with the force of his smile, and she’s happy for him.

5

“Did you approve time for this period?” Sarah doesn’t have much reason to come down to the archives, and honestly, she doesn’t like to, but she’d noticed that their files were off, and since they haven’t gone fully paperless yet, she decided to make the trek downstairs to talk to Jon about it. Jon is… fine. He was much better when he was in research, quiet and mean, but occasionally friendly. Tim and Sasha would drag him to the commons for lunches and she’d seen him laughing before. It transformed his face; he really is a handsome man when he’s smiling. He musters one up for her, a tired thing, but seemingly sincere.

“Yes, sorry Sarah, I just need to sign the forms if you’d give me a moment.” He flips through a few files on the corner of his desk before unearthing a file marked ‘time’ in a clear, clean hand. Sarah’s always liked Jon’s handwriting; the straight-backed letters and their friendly, round companions. She’s had enough time to get used to it by now, what with his promotion and all, she sees it every time he submits files up to HR. He searches briefly for a pen, though there is one stuck in his bun, before unearthing a chewed-up biro from the bottom of a drawer. Jon signs the timesheets and hands them over. Sarah thanks him with a smile.

“Perfect, I’ll get these sorted when I get back upstairs. I did come down here to ask, though, I noticed a little discrepancy with the new hire, Melanie King? She’s not been getting back to my emails, so I just wanted to come down here and see her?” Jon hums in acknowledgement.

“She’s not in the office right now,” he offers, not quite apologetically.

“Okay, well, if you could just ask her to check her email, or even come see me when she gets the chance, that’d be much appreciated!”

“Of course. If that’s all…?” 

“Yes, yes, I’ll get out of your way, thanks Jon.”

“Thanks,” he echoes, turning back to his computer in a clear dismissal. She wants to be annoyed, and she is, a little, but he just looks so tired that she doesn’t have the heart to say anything. She idly flips through the timesheets as she starts out of his office and pauses. He’s mis-signed his name. He must _really_ be tired. Doesn’t Elias give him any time off?

“Oh, Jon?”

“Yes?” He says on an annoyed sigh.

“You’ve signed your name wrong, here,” says Sarah, offering him a sheet. His brow furrows and he quickly scans the page. He scowls. 

“No, I haven’t.”

“Last I checked, your surname was Sims, not _Magnus_. Has that changed?” She expects him to laugh it off, apologize maybe, tell her he’s been burning the candle at both ends, and fix the issue, but he just blinks, and says,

“Yes, it has, rather. I thought I submitted the proper paperwork regarding the issue.” Sarah stalls out.

“What?”

“I got married?” says Jon, holding his left hand up with a slight wince. Her gaze catches on the handsome silver band on his ring finger. 

“…so you changed your name. Alright, er, what to, again?” Sarah looks down at the sheets of paper she’s holding. It is written clearly, in lovely cursive,

“Jonathan Magnus,” He says promptly, still vaguely annoyed and confused by her continued presence. She stares at him. Of course Jon ‘I Hate People’ Sims went out and suddenly got married. Of course he’d _somehow_ found someone with the last name of their workplace. Sure. Reasonable. Sarah nods woodenly.

“Of course, sorry, Jon. I’ll look for that name change paperwork when I get back in the office. Maybe Kevin misfiled it. Bye.”

“Er, okay. Thank you.” Says Jon, wincing a bit. Sarah leaves the archives, waving absentmindedly to Tim and Martin, before all but sprinting back to the HR office to tell Kevin all about the wild shit that’s going on in the archives. At least this time it’s that Jon’s eloped and not some evil worms or whatever the fuck.

+1

“Darling?” Jonah calls from the kitchen. Jon is standing out on the balcony, watching the city go about it’s business. Jonah likes to accuse Jon of treating him like a housewife, but the truth of the matter is that he just loves to cook, and Jon’s idea of a nutritious dinner is peanut butter toast. “Dinner’s ready, come inside.”

Jonah’s set up a simple dinner in the breakfast nook, lit some candles. Jon touches his thumb to his ring as he closes the door to the balcony and comes inside. His husband kisses his cheek and hands him a bottle of wine before stepping out of the kitchen. Jon smiles to himself as he takes a couple wine glasses to the table and pours the nice red Jonah’s chosen. Jonah keeps trying to feed him bites of food as they eat, much to Jon’s embarrassment and delight. 

After dinner, they bump elbows at the sink as they do the washing up together. Jon can’t believe he’s gotten so lucky with Jonah. They’re two sides of the same coin, a perfect match, and though he’s had his reservations about the methods of Jonah’s prolonged life, he’s put that to the back of his mind.

Jonah drifts away into the living room eventually, touching Jon’s lower back as he passes. Jon wipes down the countertops while listening to Jonah flipping through his records in the other room. He eventually puts on a slow ballad that Jon hums along to. He dries his hands and goes out into the living room, where Jonah’s lit the fire and refilled their glasses of wine. He’s flipping through the book Jon’s been reading, laughing at Jon’s annoyed little notes in the margins. He’s swaying slightly to the music, like he doesn’t even know he’s doing it.

Affection squeezes Jon’s heart.

“Will you dance with me?” It’s out of his mouth before he can stop it, but Jonah turns a delighted smile on him, and he’s physically incapable of taking it back. Jonah takes the lead, of course, the control freak. Elias is not a particularly tall man, but Jon is short, and the perfect height to rest his head on his shoulder. Still, he complains, “I asked you to dance, I should get to lead,”

“So take the lead,” Jonah retorts, squeezing his hand. Jon hums in contented dissent.

“No, I’m protesting your callousness.” 

“Poor thing,” coos Jonah, resting his head on Jon’s. They eventually stop actually dancing as the record winds down, just swaying together in the silence. Jon’s eyes are closed, and he’s so relaxed as to be near sleep when Jonah whispers into his ear,

“I really do love you, Jonathan Magnus, my archivist.”

“I love you, too, Jonah,” Jon sighs, tipping his head up for a kiss. Jonah obliges.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!


End file.
